1 88 STAGE-COACH AND MAIL IN DAYS OF YORE 



on the subject of these suburban coaches, for, 

 being drawn by only two horses, they were 

 regarded by the four-in-hand artists with contempt. 

 It has thus, in the absence of available information, 

 often jnizzlcd inquiring minds in the present 

 generation to understand how the heaA^y passenger 

 traffic Avas conducted betAveen London and the out- 

 lying towns and villages within a radius of twenty 

 miles. Those districts were served by these " short 

 stao-es," as thev were called — coaches drawn bv two 

 horses, and making two or more journeys each 

 way daily. There was an incredibly large number 

 of these useful vehicles, which were in relation to 

 the mails and fast long-distance coaches Avhat the 

 suburban trains are to the exj^resses in our oaaii 

 day. The ordinary coach-proprietors had rarely 

 anything to do Avith these conversances, Avliieh came 

 to and set out from a number of obscure inns and 

 coach-offices in all parts of the City and the AVest 

 End. 



One of these short stages is nn^ntioned in 

 David Copperfield, Avhcre David's page-boy, 

 stealing Dora's Avatch and selling it, purchases a 

 second-hand flute and exj)ends the balance of his 

 ill-gotten gains in incessantly traA^elling \\\) and 

 down the road between London and Uxbridge. 

 Evidently a lover of the road, this larcenous page- 

 boy. Most boys in buttons (and certainly the 

 typical page-boy of the tyj)ical farce) Avould have 

 expended tlie i)lunder in pastiy or tobacco. This 

 particular sjx'cimen, the diligent Dickens-reader 

 Avill remember, Avas taken to Doav Street on the 



